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Posts Tagged ‘sports’

Thanksgiving, the most festive and gluttonous day in between Halloween and Christmas, is a holiday steeped in family and tradition. For some that tradition includes dressing up like pilgrims and bringing an entire turkey dinner into the Main Street Railroad Station. For many others, the traditional Thanksgiving celebration includes the ubiquitous background noise of American professional football. Specifically, the annual battles between the Detroit Lions, Dallas Cowboys, and whichever other random teams are forced to skip a holiday and play football on short rest. Seriously though, football is as much a part of Thanksgiving at the Parade, the turkey, and the giant stack of Black Friday advertisements in the morning newspaper. This leaves many people to ask us “where is the best place to watch Thanksgiving football at Walt Disney World?”

A typical Thanksgiving meal at Walt Disney World. This one in particular is at Sanaa.Credit: Tammy Whiting

There are a few obvious choices. First of all, as you already know, the Thanksgiving games are broadcast on the major networks and are available on the televisions in all Walt Disney World Resort hotel rooms. So staying in your room for the game (or games) of choice is an easy, yet also a potentially boring and lonely option. There is also the Boardwalk Resort’s ESPN Club, the standard sports destination on property. The main problem with the ESPN Club is the crowds, especially on an NFL football day during an extremely busy time at the Resort. Moreover, both of these options are neither festive or particularly inventive. To remedy this we’ve come up with our list of four other places to watch Thanksgiving football at Walt Disney World.

The criteria for making our list was threefold: an establishment must have televisions on site capable of tuning into a football game, it must serve something that can reasonably constitute a Thanksgiving dinner, and it must have come to the mind of this author. Seriously. I don’t know everything. (Don’t tell my wife!) If you’ve ever done Thanksgiving sports viewing at Walt Disney World and know of some spots not mentioned, please chime in down below in the comments or on Facebook.

There are a great many variables that go into planning a Walt Disney World vacation and yet, while important to many sports fans, timing a vacation around a specific sporting event is not always feasible. If you are faced with the dilemma of finding a spot on Walt Disney World property to watch a “big game,” know that you’re neither alone nor short on options.

Walt Disney World resorts carry all of the major networks, meaning that most of the biggest sporting events like the Super Bowl, World Series, or Daytona 500 require going no further than your resort hotel room. As Disney owns the ESPN family of networks, you can find almost every ESPN channel in the resorts as well, giving you easy viewing of most college bowl games, FIFA World Cup, Monday Night Football, the NBA, etc. The resort television package also includes TBS (MLB playoffs, NCAA tournament), TNT (NCAA Tournament), MSNBC & CNBC (Olympics), Golf Channel, NFL Network, MLB Network, and both CBS and NBC Sports. At the current time the resort television package DOES NOT include Fox Sports 1 (MLB playoffs, college sports, UFC) or TruTV (NCAA tournament.)

If watching a sporting event in your resort hotel room is either not possible (sleeping kids, uninterested family, etc.) or undesirable (you ARE on vacation, after all) be aware that most hotel bars and pool bars will have these channels and will generally be willing to tune in to whatever sporting event you ask. I watched my fantasy football team lose their championship game during a Broncos/Bengals Monday Night Football telecast on TV at Port Orleans French Quarter’s Scat Cat’s Lounge. (Darn you Giovanni Bernard!) Just be aware that these lounges often close around midnight, so they are not the best bet for overtime or extra innings. In an emergency situation, you can sometimes find televisions in the resort guest laundry rooms. I once watched the New Jersey Devils clinch a Stanley Cup in a laundry room while waiting for a swimsuit to dry.

We’ve been watching the construction and following the permit filings for months, but now it is finally official: NBC Sports Grill & Brew is coming to Universal Orlando CityWalk, on the site of the former NASCAR Sports Grille.

The new venue was announced at an industry convention last night, and publicly revealed today via the following Youtube video:

The new NBC Sports Grill Brew is bound for the site of Universal CityWalk’s former NASCAR restaurant. (Photos by Seth Kubersky)

Since late last year, the entire theme park community (ok, just Derek Burgan) has been mourning the closure of the NASCAR Sports Grille, and eagerly awaiting news of what’s next for the former restaurant’s prominent footprint along the promenade of Universal Orlando‘s CityWalk. After months of watching NASCAR’s slow-motion demolition, we finally have evidence confirming rumors that an NBC Sports themed restaurant would be the new replacement. User “CatCatCat” on the OrlandoUnited.com forums was the first to share a new State of Florida business license filing that lists “NBC Sports Grill Brew” as the new eatery’s name.

Recently my boys and I returned from another fun-filled adventure in Disney World. Being huge sports fans, one of our family’s favorite spots during every Disney World trip is ESPN Club. We love the wide selection of games to watch and foods to eat that this restaurant has to offer. ESPN Club is very unique and the perfect place to take a break and watch the big game during your vacation. If you have a sports lover in your traveling group, please read on for all of the details.

Nothing says “summer” like a little beach volleyball. But if you can’t make it to the beach this weekend, the Disneyland Resort is bringing the beach to Anaheim. Now through Sunday, August 4, Downtown Disney is hosting the “Summer Celebration” Sand Volleyball Tournament and Pro Exhibition in a championship-sized sand court constructed near the AMC Theaters and Earl of Sandwich.

On Friday and Saturday (8/2 & 8/3) VolleyOC will play the final championship games of their tournament at Downtown Disney. On Sunday (8/4), Association of Volleyball Professionals (AVP) players (including Ed Ratledge, Pedro Brazao, Mark Williams and Matt Olson) and 2008 Olympic gold medalist Rich Lambourne will sign autographs and play a pro exhibition.